Practice Makes Perfect

Sermon for Green Lake Church of Seventh-day Adventists
for July 21, 2018

Texts: Deuteronomy 11:18-21, Luke 2:48-52

Wednesday morning I reviewed three photos I had taken on Tuesday night at Vacation Bible School here at the church. I counted 30 kids. That’s a weighty responsibility and a rich privilege. 30 kids with eager faces and bubbling energy.

Then I counted the adults in the pictures--23. And that did not include a number of adults and a teenager or two working in the kitchen. That number did not include the five adults leading music. So, if I counted correctly, on Tuesday night there were more grown-ups here than kids.

Which is a beautiful thing. A perfect example of church the way it is supposed to be. Devoted to the nurture of children.

I often cite statements by Jesus highlighting the status of children. This high regard for children is evident in the Bible from the very beginning. Children matter.

The one time God offered an explanation of why he chose Abraham as the progenitor of the Special People, God said, I chose Abraham because he would teach his children. Genesis 18:19.

The Book of Deuteronomy consists of five sermons preached by Moses at the end of his life, a sort of final testament. One of the central themes of the book, is Teach your children.   We heard one of those passages in our Old Testament reading this morning.

Commit yourselves wholeheartedly to these words of mine. Tie them to your hands and wear them on your forehead as reminders. Teach them to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up. Write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, so that as long as the sky remains above the earth, you and your children may flourish in the land the LORD swore to give your ancestors. Deuteronomy 11:18-21 NLT, accessed through Blue Letter Bible.com.

This passage ran through my head this week as I spent time hanging with the grown-ups and kids at Vacation Bible School. I saw people investing a lot of time and effort in children--children of our church and others who also joined us. Our kids are perfect. That is they are just right for awaking our intense affection and admiration. And their very perfection awakens in us holy ambitions for them. We want to replicated in their lives the story of Jesus that we heard in our New Testament reading:

Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and all the people. Luke 2:52

As a Christian congregation, a community shaped by the words and ministry of Jesus, we have no higher calling than to support our children as they grow in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and all people.

So to all of you who put in so many hours, so much creativity and love, to make this year’s Vacation Bible School happen, thank you. Thank you not just from me. Thank from the congregation. And thank you from the one who sits on the throne of the Kingdom of Heaven.

Thank you to Bryan for leading out. Thank you to Biannca and Brenda and Olga and Beverly and ??? who created the fantastic decorations.

Each evening began with supper. Thank you to LaRene for organizing the suppers and thank you to all the people who worked with her. The food was wonderful. Following supper we had singing led by Gummi and Nancy and Scott. Thank you musicians. Your music bright and lyrical. It was perfect. We had a Bible lesson on video, then the kids split into three groups. The groups moved through a rotation of science lessons, games, and crafts.

Thank you Elyse for the geology lessons. I couldn’t believe it. The first night, each kid got to break open their own geode. That was just the coolest thing ever. On another night the kids fished around in a bin of dry beans to find actual fossils that were buried there-shark teeth, crinoids, brachiopods, ammonites, orthoceras. Karla Walter and her team did amazing crafts. One night they mixed exotic and common ingredients to make cave slime. Another night they made bats.

Karen Baker and her team organized games every night to burn off some excess energy.

Karin did a continued story.

It was a hopping, happy place.

Thank you to all who made it happen.

When I think about what it takes to make Vacation Bible School happen, I cannot help it, my mind also wanders to consideration of the work required to provide all our other kids programming. Every week, volunteers provide high quality programs for children and teens. The faithfulness and generosity of these volunteers makes this a welcoming place for the perfect children God has placed among us. The perfect children who will grow in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and all the people. You volunteers are the hands and heart of God in coaching these young people in their growth.

Thank you.

One of the truisms in every endeavor is practice makes perfect. Last weekend some of our members participated in the STP, the Seattle to Portland bicycle ride. It’s two hundred miles. The day was fiercely hot. They made it.

Some of us are thinking--wow! 200 miles! On a bicycle??!!! Others sitting here are thinking that sounds like a nice day’s ride. What makes the difference? Practice. When a person trains mileage that once seemed daunting becomes merely a description of what you do when you have a free day.

It is the same in spiritual life. When we practice spiritual disciplines, we are shaped by the disciplines until what once seemed like an impossible challenge becomes a normal part of our life.

When we make it a daily practice to pray for people, including our enemies, we find it easier to forgive them.

When we make a daily habit of reading the Bible or other devotional literature, we will find it easier to speak words that are honest and kind.

Through years of practicing meditation, we will develop softer hearts toward others who are broken and unskilled at living.

Practice makes perfect.

Here at church we pour a lot of effort into programs aimed at supporting our children as they grow in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and other people. This is one of our highest callings.

All of us who have children in our homes, let’s pledge ourselves to support our children’s practice. Let’s model and teach regular prayer, attention to holy words, Sabbath-keeping, kindly speech. Acts of compassion.

Let’s practice. And let’s encourage our children in their practice.

Because practice makes perfect. 

Acts of Kindness

Sermon manuscript for Green Lake Church, Sabbath, February 6, 2016

Texts: 1 Kings 19:1-8 and Matthew 7:7-14

Katrina gave me a book for Christmas: Humans of New York. It's a collection of portraits and very short stories. One picture that calls me back repeatedly shows a man with one weird eye. It's not obvious to me just what is wrong with his eye, but clearly it's “different.”

Here is the story that goes with the photo:

I had just lost the sight in my right eye. It was terribly disorienting. It was hard to walk. I bumped into things. I bumped into a girl out in front of an ice cream shop and knocked her ice cream cone to the sidewalk.

She hollered at me. “What? Are you blind or something?”

I felt really bad. I'm sorry, I said. Really sorry. Actually I am blind. I didn't mean to bump into you. Let me buy you another cone.

Then she was sorry for hollering at me and protested, “No. That's all right. You don't have to.”

We walked into the shop and she ordered her cone.

“I heard the whole thing.” the clerk said. “Ice cream is free.”

Stuff happens in this world. People go blind. People bump into each other and ice cream cones get knocked to the ground. People misunderstand and get angry and holler. That's life. That's plain, ordinary, regular vanilla life. That's the way it goes.

Then someone apologizes and explains. Ah, that makes things better.

Then someone offers to buy a replacement cone. That makes things even better. It brings life back to even.

Then someone offers free ice cream and the universe is better than it was before. Not just better than it was when the cone flew out of her hand and hit the sidewalk. Better than when she bought the cone. Better than when she had her first lick.

That act of kindness by the shop clerk made the universe better than when she first imagined the pleasure of an ice cream cone.

The apology was sincere, certainly. But it was also required. If the blind man had failed to apologize he would have been a jerk. Sure, he didn't mean to bump into the girl with the cone. Still, he did. He owed her something. He owed her an apology.

And he owed her more. He owed her a replacement for her lost ice cream. So he did the right thing and brought his little piece of the universe back to even.

Then the shopkeeper offered free ice cream. It was not an obligation. He owed neither the girl nor the blind man. It was a gift. It was a pure act of kindness.

And the entire universe was made a little better, a little sweeter, a little more beautiful. That shopkeeper was cooperating in the deepest desire of God.

One of the most famous passages in the teachings of Jesus was featured in our New Testament reading this morning.

Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened for you. Everyone who asks receives. The one who seeks will find. For the person who knocks, the door will be opened.

These are wildly optimistic words. What was Jesus thinking? He went on to explain the basis for this hopeful declaration.

What mom or dad among you, if the kids ask for bread will instead give them a stone? And if your kids asks for a salmon, will you give them a rattlesnake?

If you, ordinary mortals with the ordinary frailties and dysfunctions of humanity—if you know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask?

If you want to understand God look into your own heart as a parent. What would you not do for your kids? Just this week I was visiting with a couple of single guys. We were talking theology—what is God like. I suggested they imagine God as the father they wished they had had. “Don't imagine God as your father,” I said. “Imagine God as the father you would aim to be if you had kids.” Their faces lit up. They are good men. They know the kind of dads they would aim to be.

And that is what God is like. God delights in doing good for his children.

Because that is what God is like, Jesus argues, that is what you should be like. Since God is so generous and kind, you, too, should be generous and kind. What does this divine kindness look like?

Therefore whatever you wish people would do for you, that is what you should do for them. This is the moral core of everything the ancient prophets have written.

We are to do for others what we wish they would do for us because that is what God is like. God is generous. God delights in doing good for his children. And God is highly pleased when we do good for his children. When we practice acts of kindness we are bringing great pleasure to the heart of God. And when we have come to know God deeply, we take pleasure with God in doing acts of kindness. We know the pleasure of God in our own pleasure in doing good.

Be kind.

I am not talking about grand, heroic actions. I'm not talking about running into burning buildings. I'm not talking about tackling a gunman. I'm talking about cultivating the habit of doing little acts of kindness.

Karin often prays in the morning, asking God to show her someone that needs a kindness that day. And, she tells me, it seems that when she prays that prayer, opportunities present themselves.

A driver ends up in the wrong lane and needs someone to all him to turn across two lanes to get where he needs to go.

Someone in front of you in the grocery line is a few dollars short and is trying to figure out which item can wait for another day.

The woman waiting your table today at lunch is working Saturdays only because her kid is sick and her insurance deductible is more than she makes in a month. So she's working extra shifts. And you double or triple her tip. It won't break your budget. You won't even remember doing it. But she will.

We can cultivate an eye for opportunities to perform small acts of kindness. And in so doing enter a deeper, richer communion with God.

Jesus does not stop with simply directing us to show kindness. He warns against failing to show kindness.

Go through the narrow gate. Wide is the gate and broad the path that heads toward destruction. Hordes of people rush that direction. But narrow is the gate and skinny the path that leads to life. Only the elite find it.

What does it mean to be a Christian, to live the Christ life? It means to do to others as you would have them do to you. It means to speak of others as you would have them speak of you.

It means ultimately joining God in regarding every human as kin.

We show kindness—the obligation of kinship—to every human. And as we do, we find ourselves partnering with God.

Our Old Testament reading today recounted a favorite story.

The prophet Elijah had done a heroic, daring exploit for God. The next day was payback time. Wicked Queen Jezebel was going to kill him. So he ran for his life. A couple of days into the run, he finally runs out of gas. He lies down exhausted physically, utterly spent emotionally.

He prays, “God let me die” and sinks into a deep sleep.

Sometime later, an angel wakes him up. To his astonishment, Elijah sees some food cooking over a fire and a jug of water. He eats the food, drains the jug of water and collapses back into sleep.

Hours later, an angel wakes him again. And again there is food on the campfire and water in a jug.

Elijah eats and drinks.

And in the strength of that food continues his run.

Kindness.

Years ago I read a book by a guy named Peter Jenkins, called Walk Across America. Fairly early in his walk he was in West Virginia or in the mountains of Virginia. He had gotten sick. It was cold and raining. He was miserable and exhausted. He was walking up a hill that went forever. And ever and ever. He was hungry. He was out of food and could hardly wait to get to the next town to resupply.

A car came up beside him. The driver rolled down his window and greeted him. And offered him a ride. Peter writes how tempting it was. He could see the warm air wafting out of the window. He could see the happy, comfortable people in the car. But the whole point of the project was to walk all the way. If he took this ride, why not just take rides the whole way. He had to say no. But it was hard. Finally, he thanked the driver and said no thanks.

The van started up got a hundred yards up the road and then stopped and backed up. When he came even with Peter the driver rolled down his window again and extended his arm. In his hand a big apple.

Peter took the apple. The car drove off.

Peter took a bite of the apple. It was heaven.

Peter writes how that simple act transformed that afternoon. It became a metaphor for the kindness he encountered over and over and over again as he hiked 4000 miles down the east coast then west across America.

It wasn't much in the great scheme of things. It was an apple. But that cold, hungry day on a lonely mountain road in Virginia it gave his legs and his soul new wings.

A simple act of kindness.

God give us the wisdom and the initiative to show kindness this week.

Money: Tool of Happiness

Preliminary draft for a sermon on Sabbath, September 14, 2013

At Green Lake Church of Seventh-day Adventists

There was a little box on the front page of Tuesday's Seattle Times:

1 percent's share of household income:  [Need data]

1 percent's increase in household income 2012 over 2011:  [Need data]

The top of the economic pyramid here in the U.S. Is doing pretty good. If they have trouble knowing what to do with their money, Porsche is ready to help them out.

On Thursday a Seattle Times article carried this title: $845,000 Porsche hybrid gets better gas mileage than Prius.

Porsche’s $845,000 918 Spyder hybrid, unveiled at the International Auto Show in Frankfurt, can reach 62 miles per hour in 2.8 seconds and gets the equivalent of about 72 miles per gallon, based on European fuel-economy data. That tops the 50 mpg of the basic Prius hybrid.

http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2021795781_porschehybridxml.html?cmpid=2628

Apparently, if you have enough money, you can pretend you care about the environment by spending most of a million dollars on a car that gets better gas mileage than a Prius. It also just happens to be able to reach 62 miles an hour in 2.8 seconds.

At the other end of the spectrum there is Hawo Abdi Farah. She came to Seattle 17 years ago from Somalia. She works as hard as she can and saves all she can so she can send money back to her family in Somalia. Her best efforts allow her to send between 100 and 200 dollars a month. Somalis all around the world are doing the same thing. Working hard. Scrimping and saving and sending money back home. Their money is absolutely essential for life to continue in Somalia.

Oxfam estimates these “remittances” total $1.3 billion a year. That's more than Somalia receives from foreign aid and foreign direct investment combined.

The newspaper reporter asked Farah what her relatives back in Somalia do with the money she sends

them. Farah's answer: “Food. They spend it on food. That's all”

http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2021812761_sarahcolumn13xml.html

Money is central to our lives.

Everything we do is intertwined with money. Our cars, our houses, our food, our clothes . . . Our romances and vacations . . . Our wars and lawsuits . . . . Everything. Every aspect of our lives is inseparable from money.

If our religion does not speak about money, it's irrelevant. If our spiritual practices fail to connect with our personal finances and our views of economics, then our kids may rightly judge our religion to be merely a quaint decoration, a nostalgic relic.

Money is life. If religion is going to engage life, our lives, inevitably it will speak of money and shape our actual practice of money management.

Of course, thinking about money quickly gets complicated. In the political realm, this complexity leaps into any conversation around the income disparity highlighted by the facts I mentioned about the income of the One Percent. Is this disparity a good thing or a bad thing? Is it a sign that the system is working or the system is broken? Is it an important fact or is it merely trivia? What does justice look like when you examine the play of intelligence, diligence, luck, families of origin, and tax code?

Get three people in a room to talk about it and you'll hear at least four opinions. Including the Bible in the conversation does not make it simpler. Reflecting the reality of real-life economics, the Bible's teachings about money are profoundly complicated. Is wealth a mark of ruthless, Darwinian triumph or a sign of the blessing of God? Is poverty a call for compassion or a mark of irresponsibility?

Did you catch the contrast in our scripture readings? The first passage, the one from Deuteronomy, celebrates prosperity. All through the book of the Bible, we read different versions of “Obey God and he will make you prosperous.” “Do the right thing and God will give you bountiful harvests and large flocks and herds. Life will be good.” The second passage, the one from James, imagines wealthy people as parasites and predators. Rich people get that way through deceit and violence. They are rich because of their skill in impoverishing others.

In Deuteronomy wealth is what God desires for his people. In James wealth is suspect. Its potential for seduction is far more prominent than its potential for good.

For today's sermon, I'm going to focus on the positive view of money and wealth presented in Deuteronomy. We'll deal with the cautions about wealth found in Amos and James another time.

Let's look again at the passage from Deuteronomy that was read earlier in our service: (Use one of the Bible's in the pew or call up one on your phone or tablet. I'm using the New Living Translation.)

You must set aside a tithe of your crops--one-tenth of all the crops you harvest each year. Bring this tithe to the designated place of worship--the place the LORD your God chooses for his name to be honored--and eat it there in his presence. Deuteronomy 14.

The Jewish people were expected to regard ten percent of their harvest as sacred. It belonged to God. They were not free to do with it just whatever they wanted. It could only be used for purposes specifically delineated by God.

The tithe belonged to God. What did that mean? What would God do with bushels of wheat, baskets of apples and jars of wine? According to this passage, God intended to use “his share” of the harvest as the foundation for a festival, a party for his children. The Jews were to take their tithe, the sacred ten percent of their harvest, to the special holy place and there they were to feast in the presence of God and in company with God's people.

Most of what they produced—ninety percent, in fact—was theirs to manage according to the ordinary demands and ambitions of life. They were responsible to make sure they produced enough food to supply daily meals through the entire year. They were free to produce surplus and sell it at market. It would make sense to turn some of their harvest into silver. If they were smart and hard-working and blessed with good luck, they could build wealth that included a larger house, increased acreage, servants, nice clothes.

The image of a successful, prosperous farmer lies behind the call in this passage for the practice of tithing—that is the devotion of ten percent of their harvest, ten percent of their increase or harvest to God.

The notion of tithe presumes financial success. God wants his people to do well. He expects that the normal human experience will be comfortable prosperity.

With that expectation in the background, God called for those Jewish farmers to devote ten percent of their harvest to God. Which raises the obvious question: What is God going to do with all that grain and produce?

The first purpose mentioned in this passage is a sacred party. The Jewish people were to take their tithe, go to the sacred place and eat their tithe together in a grand festival.

The passage goes on to broaden the purpose of the tithe.

At the end of every third year, bring the entire tithe of that year's harvest and store it in the nearest town. Give it to the Levites, who will receive no allotment of land among you, as well as to the foreigners living among you, the orphans, and the widows in your towns, so they can eat and be satisfied. Then the LORD your God will bless you in all your work.

Here we see that God's portion of the harvest, the tithe, is to be given to “the Levites.” I like that! The Levites were the clergy. They were specifically excluded from land ownership which in that society was the foundation of wealth. Since they were excluded from commerce, the society was to provide an alternative source of support for them. This much makes sense in the usual religious way. The clergy are specially linked to worship and other religious practices, so it makes sense that they would participate in the sacred money of the tithe.

The Adventist Church has built a very specific doctrine of tithing on this concept. When people give to the “Tithe Fund” in our denomination, their donation supports the work of the clergy.

In this passage, the appropriate use of God's portion is broader than just the support of the clergy class. Tithe is also to be given to

the foreigners living among you, the orphans, and the widows in your towns, so they can eat and be satisfied. Then the LORD your God will bless you in all your work.

One of the most emphatic teachings of the Bible regarding money is this: we ought to recognize Somali immigrants as part of the people we are to provide for from God's portion. And Mexicans and Eritreans and Russians. Deuteronomy declares that foreigners are to be served from the Tithe that is God's portion.

Widows—people who is Moses society would have had a status like single working moms in our society—were to be served from God's portion.

Orphans—kids whose parents for whatever reason were unable to provide for them—orphans were to be served from God's portion.

It seems to me that we could summarize the ideas in this passage this way: the highest purpose of money is to build a happy, equitable community. A bountiful harvest is a call for a bountiful feast. A feast that is shared in the presence of God. Wealth should express itself in community festivity. And our feasts should include the outsiders and the losers and those with bad luck and those with disabilities.

To put it another way: a bountiful harvest, i.e. wealth, confers a heightened obligation.

This passage and the repeated affirmation of hard work and wealth all through the book of Deuteronomy implies special honor is due to those responsible for the harvest. The bountiful harvest is evidence of God's blessing, God's favor. God is pleased with those who provide the feast.

In Deuteronomy, there is a wonderful, blended vision of wealth as a basis for honor and obligation.

Those who are successful are partners with God. The feast depends on the skill and diligence that produce the harvest. God depends on us to grow the food, to do the harvest, to preserve what is produced. God blesses us with physical strength, intelligence, social skills, drive and initiative. We did not create those things. They are gifts.

We cultivate our awareness of how utterly dependent we are on the gifts by practicing tithing—devoting ten percent of our income to God.

Did you produce your wealth by working hard? Good. Did you create the mental strength which you have employed in your pursuit success? How much credit do you deserve for choosing to be born in Seattle instead of in Haiti? Did you earn an MBA or an MD or a PhD? Good. That is to be commended. You deserve honor for that achievement. But if you get a big head about it, we can justly ask what teachers encouraged you along the way? How much tax money has gone into building the university where you studied? None of us is self-made.

Practicing tithing is a concrete, spiritual practice that connects us with the wisdom of interdependence.

Recently a young friend who is a teacher posted something on Facebook about the median incomes of people ten years out of college. What degrees gave the most bang for the buck? At the top of the list: petroleum mining engineers. Near the bottom of the list: counselors, social workers, ministers.

I read the comments responding to the initial article. They quickly degenerated into snarky attacks. “Petroleum engineers don't care about the environment or about people.” “Counselors don't understand that the cars they drive to work run on gasoline made available through the work of the petroleum engineers.” “Petroleum engineers are smart. Psychologists are wouldn't recognize a solution to an equation if they saw one.” “Petroleum engineers will produce the children who will need the services of the counselors to counteract the lousy parenting skills of the engineers.”

It was a stupid fight.

Engineering, manufacturing, finance create the wealth in our society that allows people to specialize in counseling, theology or music. The producers of wealth deserve respect for the foundational role they play in making a good society. On the other hand, would anyone want to live in a society that was flush with money and stuff and had no musicians, no art, no articulate preachers or writers? In a good society money moves around and links people with all sorts of gifts and skills and aptitudes. Money makes us all richer, not just by putting dollars in our pockets but by enabling this rich cultural development.

Understanding the power of money to enable this kind of goodness is a profound spiritual insight. One of the most powerful spiritual disciplines that supports this understanding is the practice of tithing—devoting ten percent of our income to God. When we tithe, we are deliberately using our money to cultivate our spiritual life.

Adventists have taken this ten percent principle and developed a particular doctrine around it. Some Christians have criticized Adventists for being so strict. They imagine themselves as more evolved. They are not legalistic, Old Testament believers. They are “New Testament Christians.”

I laugh when I hear this. It is true the New Testament does not explicitly teach the obligation to devote ten percent of our income to God. Instead, it tells us to sell everything we have and give it to the poor.

I have never met a critic of tithing who has come even close to this NT teaching.

I once knew a baronness who was rich. Compared to me, she was very rich. She explained to me the reason she did not practice tithing: “For ordinary, middle class people, tithe is a small amount of money. So they can afford to give it. But for me ten percent would be a lot of money. So I can't afford to do it.”

I realized then that I was richer than she was. Her income might have ten or a hundred times my income. But she had barely enough money. In fact, as I got to know her, I learned she was constantly worried about the fact that she was barely getting by. On the other hand, I was so rich I could give away 20 percent of my income and not worry about my financial survival.

One of the curious side effects of tithing is it's reflexive effect on those who practice it. When you devote ten percent (or twenty or thirty percent) of your income to God, over time you develop a deep sense of adequacy and wealth.

This week I made my monthly contribution to the church. I didn't agonize over how much to give. Since we are rich, we can do more than ten percent. Or maybe I should say the other way around. The fact that we give more than ten percent is proof that we are rich.

Part of our religion is giving. We teach people to give ten percent, because it is the only amount ever mentioned in the Bible besides selling everything. We give because we have been blessed. Then we are blessed because we give. Our handling of money becomes a rich spiritual practice and a source of pure joy.

This is part of what our religion teaches us about money.

If we are serious about cultivating spiritual life, we will give habitually. Occasional, spontaneous giving is okay. I'm sure it does good. But it has very little of the transformative power of regular, habitual, systematic giving.

We all understand that part of ordinary life is regularly paying utility bills, buying groceries, paying our mortgage or rent. If we are students or the parents of students, we pay tuition. These payments are an indispensable part of our life in a civil society.

Regular giving is similarly an indispensable part of fully participating in a spiritual society. As a church we welcome visitors. There is no expectation that people need to buy space in a pew or that any particular person buy the privilege of experiencing worship. All are welcome here. On the other hand, until you are practicing habitual giving, your spirituality will remain stunted. Since money flows through every aspect of our life, a fully developed spirituality necessarily includes the practice, the habit, of giving. Tithing is most form of giving with longest tradition in Jewish and Christian history.

Those who have practiced it nearly universally speak of its benefit. It is a practice that will provide a theoretical and experiential foundation for wise thinking about money. It makes us happy partners with God.